I hear you both, and think now that I should have put a disclaimer on the top of this message.
I do not, for one second, think this message fits all.
Here, I think, is the essential difference between "earned depression" and clinical depression:
Quote:
...This is your depression - you've earned it and they're just going to damn well have to put up with it!
If you can relate to the passages above then you owe it to yourself to read on. You're falling into one of the most common emotional traps there are. Yes, it is a trap and once you get caught up in it things can only get worse.
In the beginning the trap seems perfectly reasonable. It doesn't feel like a trap at all. If we've had a hard time it's normal to feel bad about it, after all everybody gets fed up at one time or another. The trap opens the moment we start justifying our misery to ourselves. We begin to tell ourselves how reasonable and indeed unavoidable our depressive feelings are. Once we do this it's as though we've opened the door to our own little prison - a very dark, gloomy prison with nothing inside but misery and depression.
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Bold added to emphasise meaning.
In short, this "earned depression," (a new phrase in my experience), clearly is seperate and different from clinical depression. It's situational, and exaserbated by our own thought processes that justify our affectiveless behavior. And even seems to dare others to doubt our depression.
I'm sorry I didn't make this clear in the beginning. I've recognized the difference between acute situational depression and chronic clinical depression for a long time. I should have been more specific upfront.
My deepest apologise if I offended. It was not my intent.
This article speaks *a* truth; not necessarily the whole truth.
Shalom!